He was looking smug now, his hands clasped behind his back as he grinned at her. “I’m taller than you,” Peter pointed out, as if that was cold hard evidence for his case.
Okay, he was a tall fifteen-year-old, but still a fifteen-year-old.
“Barely!” she shot back. “And that doesn’t mean anything, anyway.”
Snap.
A twig cracked in the distance.
The lantern clanked loudly as a violent jump ripped through her. Wendy tripped, her back colliding with Peter’s shoulder. He stumbled but caught her upper arms, steadying them both.
“What was that?” Wendy asked, the words tumbling from her lips. Was there something hiding in the trees? A person? Were they being watched? Wendy swallowed hard. She just wanted to get out of these damn woods.
“I was going to ask you the same thing.” He loosened his hold on her, but Wendy backed up again, pressing into him.
“I heard something in the trees.” Even though her whole body shook, she could feel his warmth radiating through his shirt.
“It’s okay,” Peter said. His tone was gentle. She wanted to believe him. “Here.” He took the lantern from her and she automatically wrapped her arms around her middle. Peter raised the light above her head to get a better look. “There’s nothing there,” he told her. “Probably just an owl or something.”
As if on cue, a faint hoot echoed from the trees.
Wendy let out a heavy sigh of relief.
But then a much louder hooting came from just behind her and Wendy jumped away from Peter. She whirled around to see his lips pressed into a small O. The owl in the woods hooted again and Peter responded.
Wendy pressed her fingers to her chest and felt her heart fluttering under them. “How did you do that?” she asked. He matched the owl’s call perfectly. Jordan could whistle pretty decently to match the pitch and tune of a bird, but Peter sounded exactly like a real owl.
Peter grinned and rolled his shoulders in a shrug. “Practice, I guess.” He started to walk again and Wendy stayed close to his side. Her arm brushed against his with each step.
“You must’ve had a lot of practice, then,” Wendy said, lacking her usual sarcastic tone.
“I’m just good at imitating things,” Peter said. “Animals. People.”
“People?” Did he imitate their voices like stand-up comedians did sometimes, or walk around pretending to be a pirate? She was about to ask when Peter knocked the lantern into a branch, producing a clatter of glass and metal. Wendy jumped again, wincing at the sound.
“Oops. Sorry,” said Peter.
She didn’t know how much more of this she could take. “Are we almost to my house?” she asked, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment. Every nerve in her body was on edge, rippling anxiously under her skin.
“I think so.”
“You think so?” Wendy groaned. “If we—”
“Want to hear what else I can do?” he asked.
No, she didn’t. She wanted to get out of here and back to her house.
But before Wendy could say anything, Peter handed back the lantern and cupped his hands around his mouth, producing a light, warbling tune. It was another birdcall. Wendy knew she’d heard it before, but she couldn’t place it. A swallow? Or maybe a nightingale? She didn’t really know anything about birds.
Peter dropped his hands, tucked his bottom lip under his front teeth, and produced the quiet thrum of cricket chirps.
It sounded just like the crickets that lived outside her window. Wendy fell asleep to that sound every night during the summer. The edges of his lips quirked up and the lantern’s light sparked in his eyes. Peter continued to make the gentle chirps. The sound melted the knotted muscles in her shoulders.
Memories of catching crickets at night with her brothers danced in the back of her mind. John quietly waiting in one spot with a paper cup in his hand, listening hard to find one of the musical insects. Michael careening through the bushes when he caught one, scaring the rest off. John always threw a fit. They were never able to catch more than one at a time. They would put it in a jar, turn off the lights in their bedroom, and sit in silence—after Wendy told Michael to shut up at least three times—until the cricket felt safe enough to start singing for them. Even in the dark, she could always tell that John and Michael were smiling just as much as she was.
It was one of her favorite sounds.
“You’re really good at that,” she said softly as she stared up at Peter. They weren’t walking anymore.